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Assess System Security with a Linux LiveCD

Posted by timothy on from the no-touching-the-hard-drive dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Want to assess security vulnerabilities on your Linux system without lengthy installation and configuration efforts? This article introduce four packages -- Auditor, Whoppix, Knoppix-STD, and PHLAK -- that bring you that ability through the magic of LiveCD. These four LiveCD offerings specialize in nailing down vulnerabilities."

14 comments

  1. Pretty cool by zappepcs · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Interesting that this round up of security tools is on an IBM website... well, sort of. Wonder if they will be made redundant by Vista?

    Sorry, can't help but be happy to see people in the real world, doing valuable things, getting help from large companies, and doing them before and better than MS. The world of computing is changing and MS is already irrelevant... we just don't realize it fully yet.

    Personally, I'll be checking out these four tools.

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  2. Re:No commetns in like 5 minutes? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Everyone's at church, you heathen!

  3. Audiwhax by zbuffered · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Auditor and Whax (formerly Whoppix) are merging.

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    Synergy is your friend
  4. Pen tests. by Aldric · · Score: 1

    In articles like this the author always seems to forget that there's more to security than software. What good is a secure software setup when someone can just walk into the building and plug a WiFi hub into the internal network?

    1. Re:Pen tests. by UnapprovedThought · · Score: 2, Funny

      True, but you have to take into account that some of these tools are getting smarter and smarter every time.

      I just ran Auditor on my system the other day, and while it didn't find any problems with my firewall, it was able to:

      • locate all of the pictures of lena.jpeg that some people in the office had downloaded
      • accurately guess that Liz in the next cubicle is the office's biggest security problem
      • complain that some office desktops had particularly drab background images

      So, when I clicked "yes" when it asked me if I wanted to correct the situation, it simply moved the offending pictures to Liz' desktop. Three birds...

  5. Re:No comments in like 5 minutes? by strider44 · · Score: 1

    The world is round, you isolationist priest!

  6. They sound like... by CaptainPotato · · Score: 2, Funny

    the latest sexually-transmitted diseases. Well, not Auditor perhaps, but the others...Whoppix, Knoppix-STD, and PHLAK. hate to think what happens when one catches Phlak... probably results in something that causes people to start sniffing your packets. ;)

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  7. Anymore? by stevebenson · · Score: 1

    These are awsome and will no doubt save anyone sometime when they run them it worked for and saved me about two and half hours. Was wondering if you knew of anymore?

  8. Local Area Security by b00m3rang · · Score: 1

    L.A.S. is another network tool oriented Live CD. Check it out.

  9. interesting they missed by VolciMaster · · Score: 1

    one of the popular live-CD distros, though more aimed at forensic recovery: freshmeat announcement and FCCU homepage

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